Ghassan Salamé is Dean of the Paris School of International Affairs/PSIA and professor of International Relations at Sciences-Po (Paris) and Columbia University (New York). Born in1951 in Lebanon, he studied Law (Saint- Joseph University and Paris University); Literature (PhD, Paris University); and Political science (PhD, Paris University). He taught international relations at the American and Saint-Joseph universities in Beirut and, later, at Paris University.

Salamé was Senior Advisor to the United Nations Secretary-General (2003-2006) and Political Advisor to the UN Mission in Iraq (2003). In 2000-2003, he was Lebanon’s Minister of Culture, in charge of national heritage and the arts; Chairman and Spokesman of the Organization Committee for the Arab Summit (March 2002) and of the Francophone Summit (October 2002) in Beirut.

He presently sits on the board and executive committee of the International Crisis Group (Brussels) and the boards of the Open Society Institute (New York), The Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Alexandria), the Center for International Conflict Resolution (New York), the Center for Humanitarian Action (Geneva) and a few other not-for-profit organizations. He is the founding chairman of the Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (Beirut).

He is the author of (inter alia) Quand l’Amérique refait le monde; Appels d'empire : ingérences et résistances à l'âge de la mondialisation; State and Society in the Arab Levant and editor (inter alia) of Democracy Without Democrats: Politics of Liberalization in the Arab and Muslim World; The Politics of Arab Integration and The Foundations of the Arab State. His essays have been published in Foreign Policy, Revue Française de Science Politique, European Journal of International Affairs, The Middle East Journal and other scholarly journals.